42 U.S.C. § 247d–7f — Collaboration and coordination

(a) Limited antitrust exemption: (1) Meetings and consultations: (A) Authority: The Secretary, working with the Attorney General and Secretary of Homeland Security, may hold meetings or consultations with people developing security countermeasures, qualified countermeasures, or qualified pandemic/epidemic products, to discuss developing, making, distributing, buying, or storing them. The Secretary can call a meeting on request from Homeland Security, the Attorney General, the FTC Chairman, or any interested person, or on the Secretary's own initiative. The Secretary must give advance notice of the meeting and its topics to the Attorney General, the Chairman, and Homeland Security. (B) Conditions: Each meeting must be chaired (or, for a consultation, facilitated) by the Secretary; open to people involved in developing, making, distributing, buying, or storing the countermeasure, as the Secretary decides; open to the Attorney General, Homeland Security, and the Chairman; limited to discussing "covered activities" (defined below); and run so that no national-security or confidential business information leaks outside the meeting. (C) Limitation: The Secretary cannot force participants to reveal confidential business information. (D) Transcript: The Secretary must keep a complete word-for-word transcript of each meeting. That transcript can be withheld from public disclosure if the Secretary, with the Attorney General and Homeland Security, decides releasing it would threaten national security. (E) Exemption: It is not an antitrust violation to take part in a meeting held under these rules — but this protection does not cover any resulting agreement or conduct that isn't separately exempted under paragraph (4). (2) Submission of written agreements: The Secretary must send any written agreement from these meetings to the Attorney General and the Chairman, along with an explanation of its purpose, a description of its substance and methods, why cooperation is necessary, and any other information the Attorney General wants. (3) Exemption for conduct under approved agreement: Acting under an agreement that's been granted an exemption is not an antitrust violation, for as long as the exemption lasts. (4) Action on written agreements: Within 15 business days of getting a request, the Attorney General (with the Chairman) must grant, deny, partly grant, or propose changes to the exemption, in writing to the Secretary. An approved exemption starts immediately. The Attorney General can extend the 15-day deadline by up to 10 more business days. The Attorney General can only grant an exemption if satisfied the conduct won't cause serious anticompetitive harm beyond what's reasonably needed to make sure the countermeasure or product is available. (5) Limitation on and renewal of exemptions: An exemption only covers "covered activities" and must be renewed after 3 years (with any needed changes), unless the Attorney General decides against renewal using the same standard as before. (6) Authority to obtain information: Reviewing a request to grant or renew an exemption counts as an antitrust investigation under the Antitrust Civil Process Act. (7) Limitation on parties: Using information gained under an exempted agreement for any purpose beyond what the exemption allows brings back full antitrust and other legal liability. (8) Report: Starting one year after enactment and every two years after, the Attorney General and the Chairman must report to Congress on how this antitrust exemption has been used. (b) Sunset: This whole section stops applying after December 31, 2026. (c) Definitions: (1) "Antitrust laws" means the laws defined in section 12 of title 15, plus section 45 of title 15 where it covers unfair competition methods, plus any similar state law. (2) "Countermeasure or product" means a security countermeasure, qualified countermeasure, or qualified pandemic/epidemic product, as defined in subsection (a)(1). (3) "Covered activities" generally means any activity related to developing, making, distributing, buying, or storing a countermeasure or product — but it does NOT include, between two or more people: (i) exchanging competitor cost, profit, or distribution information not reasonably needed for the exempted activity; (ii) agreeing to restrict or require licensing/sharing of things not developed through the covered activity, or restricting a participant's other research unless needed to prevent misuse of shared proprietary information; (iii) agreeing to divide up a market with a competitor beyond what's exempted; (iv) exchanging competitor production information not reasonably needed for the covered activity; (v) agreeing to restrict or require production beyond what's exempted; (vi) restricting a participant's unrelated unilateral or joint activities; or (vii) agreeing to restrict or set the sale price of a countermeasure or product.